Academics of Sumit Chaurasiya!

1. When I returned from Vrindavan, Mathura in July 2014, I had no career plan. I had taken renunciation. I tried to go back but couldn’t. Maternal grandmother and others recommended that I teach kids but having seen how government teachers actually operated I had developed a certain degree of resistance for government service. I tried teaching in a private school where corporeal punishment is a norm. I gave that job up. Since then I took tuitions and it became only means for my meagre sustenance.

2. Only student I am teaching at present is not upto the mark. He’s enrolled into standard ninth in a private school. His father, who got only middle school education is a janitor of the stadium in this city. His mother is uneducated. Some help was received by two elder siblings one of whom is good at sports. He also wants to excel at sports. Their family runs a fast food stall everyday to support itself and two brothers share their time to run the business. Sports, business and lack of educational environment leaves little room for my student to stay motivated and perform better.

3. It’s only by chance that I was selected as his English language coach. I found this job to be unrewarding because it was very low paying. It didn’t result in further jobs. He didn’t show much progress despite all the work put in to educate him. I found after first few classes that he was at best at the level of class fourth students-unable to read and write either in Hindi or in English.

4. Many such students got general promotion due to Covid. Even if there was no Covid they are promoted due to pressure from government to maintain minimal literacy rate in this state and country on paper.

5. All his time is devoted to business and sports which are going to become his career. He’s producing more wealth than I have ever produced in the last eight years since I quit serving in the temple. It’s not going to be otherwise. They can’t pay me like previous subscribers because of their limited income and I can’t really motivate him to work harder on academics. Thus: a student qualified to study only in class fourth is studying in standard ninth and it’s going to be so. It can’t be helped.

6. I have been working hard to keep the early morning classes punctual. The family being an Indian family has no sense of timing or punctuality. The kids are lost in daydreaming most of the times. Father tries his hard to maintain discipline but being overloaded with work to maintain stadium and university work he also has his limitations.

7. Previous students had their limitations too and they taught me a good deal about the education business here. Willing to teach in any private school here is like slavery for a meagre sum of three to four thousand rupees for eight to ten hours of work whereas nine thousand rupees income is criterion for people living below poverty line. I was supposed to rely on family profession of teaching after renunciation thanks to ailing mother and controlling father. It’s absolutely hopeless here unless you know grovelling flattery and servitude to falsehood.